Posts filed under ‘Unconventional Warfare’

So Where’s the Plane?

(U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sergeant Gustavo Castillo)

Illustrating the “Free” in free fall, this photo shows Air Force para rescue jumpers (PJs) performing a military free fall jump over Djibouti in East Africa on April 17, 2018. The airmen are assigned to the 82nd Expeditionary Rescue Squadron. They are deployed in support of humanitarian aid and contingency operations in the Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa area of responsibility.

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Future War.

(U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Corporal Rhita Daniel)

Infantrymen from the 4th Marines’ 3rd Battalion assessed emerging technologies and engineering innovations recently during an Urban Advanced Naval Technology Exercise at Camp Pendleton, California. The March 21, 2018 exercise saw leathernecks checking the operational utility of an unmanned light cargo vehicle, an electric tactical vehicle, protective helmets and defensive weapons like the Big Gun shown here. The name on the side of the weapon says it all. The “Drone Killer” is aimed at countering the threat from small unmanned aerial systems (drones).

Marine Corps planners expect battle-spaces in the future will include narrow streets lined by high rise buildings in densely populated megacities in Africa and Asia.

Click here to see more photos of the technology examined at the urban warfare technology exercise.

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The Marines Have Landed …

(U.S. Navy photo by Petty Officer 3rd Class Sarah Myers)

U.S. Marines maneuver combat rubber raiding craft toward Cowley Beach in Australia on July 8, 2017, during an amphibious raid rehearsal as a part of exercise Talisman Saber 17. These Marines are assigned to the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit(MEU).

… and Landed.

(U.S. Navy photo by Petty Officer 3rd Class Sarah Myers)

Here Marines are disembarking from a CH-53 Super Stallion helicopter for a ground assault training exercise as part of Talisman Saber 17 in Australia on July 12, 2017. More than 33,000 U.S. and Australian personnel are participating in the biennial joint exercise, which runs through July 25.

Featuring 21 ships, including the U.S. Navy aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan (CVN 76), the Bonhomme Richard Expeditionary Strike Group, and more than 200 joint aircraft, this is the seventh iteration of the exercise. For 2017 it is focusing on training a Combined Task Force of U.S. and Australian forces in a mid-intensity, high-end warfighting scenario.

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Paddlewheel Propulsion.

The U.S. Army’s quest for autonomous reconnaissance aircraft that can fit in the palm of a soldier’s hand has led to a breakthrough in vertical lift technology by researchers utilizing a concept long-known, but never successfully demonstrated: the cyclocopter.

The multi-modal quadrotor cyclocopter developed at the University of Maryland began aquatic mode testing in March. The unmanned aircraft, equipped with plastic foam pontoons, successfully crossed calm water. (Photo via Elena Shrestha)

A cyclocopter is a vertical lift aircraft — but unlike a helicopter — it has at least two rotors, one on either side of the servo and autopilot. A ring of rotor blades extend horizontally like the wings of an airplane and rotate around a horizontal axis, moving in a cycloidal way, like a paddlewheel on a riverboat.

Your 4GWAR editor reports on the latest developments in these tiny unmanned aircraft in the new issue of Vertiflite, a publication of the American Helicopter Society (AHS) International.

In flight, the cyclocopter’s cycloidal rotors and their circular housing look something like a speeding exercise wheel in a hamster cage, but without the hamster. The angle of the rotor blades can be shifted, altering lift and thrust that allows the aircraft to shift seamlessly from vertical to horizontal. The rotating multiple, uniform blades provide the aircraft with 360 degrees of thrust vectoring.

The cyclo rotor concept is over 100 years old with recorded experiments dating back to 1909 but early researchers focused on manned flight and were never able to demonstrate a vehicle that could fly, despite several attempts in the 1930s

With funding from the Army Research Laboratory, engineers at the University of Maryland and Texas A&M University have been designing, building and flying unmanned cyclocopters to demonstrate their agility and viability. At Maryland’s Alfred Gessow Rotorcraft Center, student researchers have built small unmanned cyclocopters ranging in weight from just over two ounces (60 grams) to almost two pounds (900 grams). The largest of the little drones is multi-modal and designed to travel across land and water, as well as the air. At Texas A&M’s Advanced Vertical Flight Laboratory, researchers have also developed a range of increasingly smaller cyclo rotor-powered drones, including one that weighs just 29 grams, currently the smallest ever made.

Anticipating challenging battle environments that U.S. forces will face in future conflicts, the Army Research Lab’s Micro Autonomous Systems and Technology (MAST) program began looking for promising technologies that would provide portable air and ground situational awareness devices for soldiers moving on foot through complex terrain, like dense urban areas. MAST’s Collaborative Technology Alliance (MAST-CTA) was created in 2008 to encourage cooperation among the military, industry and 20 research universities ….

TO READ THE REST OF THE STORY IN THE JULY/AUGUST ISSUE OF VERTIFLITE MAGAZINE, CLICK HERE.

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“I’m Batman.”

(U.S. Army photo by Sergeant Lisa M. Sadler)

No this isn’t trick photography. Look at the instructor on top to see how this photo is oriented. A soldier demonstrates how to rappel down a 40-foot tower at Camp Dawson, West Virginia, during a camp aimed at teaching children of service members about their parents’ experiences while deployed. The soldier is assigned to the West Virginia Army National Guard’s civil support team. The photo was taken June 26, 2017.